Opinion- Aero India – is there a direction?

Neelam Mathews

Oct 5, 2014

It is that time of the year again when exhibitors and guests start to schedule their calendars, start to tear their hair, grit their teeth, and down an upper or a stiff swig. Why, you ask me? Time to look at the aero india website and hope like hell everything is in order, that rates have not gone up again just because the dollar has, and visas will not be a pain as they usually are.

Hate to disappoint you, but by the looks of it, you, dear guests better brace once again for tough times to attend the mega event from Feb 18-22 2015. Yes, the site looks sexier, has a whole lot of links to government sites, which I suggest you look at later as they will take you on a roller-coaster journey as they are meant to.

An exhibitor luckier than I was, managed to access the Rates and was flabbergasted. “This is more expensive than the Singapore Air Show where we get a lot of business done. If India wants to attract investment, they should stop making this an Aladdin’s Den.” Perhaps the organizers would like to take a leaf off the recently announced aviation conclave that is looking at offering subsidized rates and some even free space to ensure people come to a country to participate that has for the past few years reeking of cons. Also, perhaps somebody will look at the disgusting toilets this time and make it part of the PMs "clean India"campaign? Perhaps a company could “sponsor” cleanliness of the toilets. Think of the brownie points you will get from all the publicity your PR firm will generate.

OK, so back to basics.  I click on RATES. It seems programmed to say: “The timeout period elapsed prior to obtaining a connection from the pool.  This may have occurred because all pooled connections were in use and max pool size was reached. “Really! You could afford to invest in a higher bandwidth one would think!"

As for media registration, you guessed it- "Timeout expired'! However, before I start to get an inferiority and persecution complex, none of the others including exhibitors can open it too. Therefore, I take solace that it is not just me.

By the way, expect to get a bit of mishmash this time –civil aviation is back! One wonders, what will happen to the Hyderabad Air Show then? Just a thought.